There is a persistent desire to perform faster, cheaper, and more accurate characterization of materials to enhance scientific understanding of the same. Compositional analysis is one focus of such characterization. Another area of leading interest is in the visualization of substances that compositionally vary with location, shape, spatial configuration, or the like—especially those of a biological nature that potentially provide better insight into disease treatment. At the same time, analysis that can be performed under ambient atmospheric conditions with little or no sample preparation time is desirable. For instance, Desorption ElectroSpray Ionization (DESI) recently has simplified preparation of samples undergoing compositional analysis by mass spectrometer. Among other sources, DESI is described in U.S. Pat. No. 7,335,897 B2 to Tákats et al. that issued 26 Feb. 2008—which is hereby incorporated by reference as if set forth in its entirety herein. Other state-of-the-art contributions to mass spectrometry and DESI are set forth in commonly owned U.S. Pat. No. 8,097,845 B2 to Roach et al. that issued 17 Jan. 2012 (the “Nano-DESI Patent”), which is also hereby incorporated by reference as if set forth in its entirety herein. Indeed, “Nano-DESI” is well-known to many of those of ordinary skill in the pertinent arts. One nonlimiting process set forth in the Nano-DESI Patent is described in connection with FIG. 3 that includes: operating a sampling probe comprised of two capillary tubes; delivering solvent to the sample with one of the tubes; removing solvent containing extracted analyte; and transferring the analyte to a mass spectrometer with the other of the tubes. As a result of these and other developments, mass spectrometry has become a more viable alternative to various counterpart technologies. Even so, it should be appreciated that the subject matter of the present application potentially relates to a whole host of different technical fields.
It has been reported that some Nano-DESI systems have been used to generate a kind of two-dimensional imagery; however, such systems tend to be limited—lacking the ability to capture detailed three-dimensional (3-D) information about a sample and its compositional variation. Accordingly, the challenges involved in these and related endeavors converge to emphasize an ongoing need for further contributions to such technologies.
As a preface to the remainder of the present application, guidance follows concerning the definition of selected terminology set forth herein. Any term subject to such definition (the “subject term”) may be of any type and applies to all forms as appears herein (e.g. any recognized inflection, declension, plural, singular, gerund, participle, comparative, superlative, infinitive verb (either accompanied by “to” or not), or other form resulting from affix modification with such affix functioning in its usual manner)—except to the extent stated to the contrary in writing herein. Furthermore, the definition of a subject term shall apply regardless of capitalization, font, character size, underlining, italicization, emboldening, character pitch, etc.) except to the extent stated to the contrary in writing herein. The definition of a subject term can be assigned by formal, direct statement (like a dictionary entry), or by one or more less direct approaches that ascribe partial or complete meaning to a subject term in addition to or in lieu of such direct statement (including designation of an acronym, abbreviation, neologism, or the like). Among these less direct approaches are: exemplification (relating the subject term to positive or negative examples); use of technical, engineering, or scientific equation, expression/notation/symbology to designate meaning to the subject term; explication of subject term application, usage, or scope; comparison of the subject term to certain other terminology that ascribes some degree of meaning, limitation, scope, or the like; existence/degree of mutual exclusivity with respect to certain other terminology; ranking, ordering, sequencing, or other relational grouping of terms including one or more subject terms; or use of negation language. As used herein, a definition can include any of these techniques alone or in any combination—any of which can be presented anywhere in the present application. When a subject term is initially defined, it is typically placed in single or double quotation marks, parentheses, emboldened, demarcated by a colon, or a combination of these that is accompanied by meaning-ascribing description. In other applications, a parenthetical can spell-out/expand an acronym or abbreviation that accompanies it or can enclose such acronym or abbreviation with the expanded description in close proximity thereto. Further, parentheses, single quotation marks, double quotation marks, and colons still can be used to selectively demarcate, emphasize, offset, or otherwise explain terminology or otherwise be employed as recognized in common English language grammatical/linguistic usage. While a definition routinely is provided with the first occurrence of a subject term, a definition provided anywhere herein is applicable to every occurrence of such subject term throughout the present application—including any occurrence before the definition unless expressed to the contrary in writing herein. Notwithstanding any of the foregoing, to the extent any term of the present application is repugnant (whether in whole or in part) to the usual meaning of such term, it is subject to the understanding that such term hereby adopts its usual meaning retroactively to the day the present application was filed in the United States of America. A list of certain definitions follows:                (1) For mass spectrometer analysis, “Analyte” broadly refers to both the molecular and ionized forms of a substance absent express limitation to one or the other.        (2) “Portion” broadly refers to a part, piece, constituent, or component that is separate from the whole and also to any part, piece, constituent, or component that is integral/unitary to the whole, or included/contained in the whole.        (3) “Shearing Force” or “Shear Force” collectively means: (a) unaligned forces pushing on one part of a body in one direction and another part of the body the opposite direction (in contrast, aligned opposing forces result in compression of the body instead of a shearing force); (b) the same as that described by any accepted definition of the subject terms in the fields of mechanical engineering, structural engineering, physics, or any other like field(s) in which the subject terminology is known to those of ordinary skill in such field(s); (c) the mechanical force that varies with separation distance between two objects in close proximity to one another even though the applicable mechanism(s) involved may be in dispute, unclear, or unknown; or (d) a combination of two or more of the foregoing to the extent consistent with one another.        (4) “Nano-Spray” means any material sprayed from a device that includes pieces of such material each having a minimum dimension of 1000 nanometers or less; and where such spraying results from any emission, flow, transport, movement, pressurized delivery, or the like of a liquid, powder, particulate matter, film, mist, droplet, vapor, power flow, or mixture of one or more of the foregoing.Any definition provided herein should be understood to supplement and not supplant any other meaning or usage not otherwise specifically addressed in any fields pertinent to the present application—except to the extent expressly stated to the contrary or inconsistent therewith. What follows next is a brief summary of a few representative inventions or other contributions provided by the present application without any intention that this summary be considered exclusive or be given greater or lesser weight or importance than any others set forth elsewhere herein.        